I would like to highlight a couple of facets of the latest Wall Street Journal Forecasting Survey:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125494927938671631.html?mod=djemalertNEWS
As stated, “The Wall Street Journal surveys a group of 52 economists throughout the year. Broad surveys on more than 10 major economic indicators are conducted every month. Once a year, economists are ranked on how well their forecasts have fared. For prior installments of the surveys, see: WSJ.com/Economist .”
I found two aspects particularly interesting. First, with regard to unemployment, “On average the economists — not all of whom answered every question — expect the unemployment rate to peak at 10.2% in February.”
Second, for all of 2010, the average forecast is for 2.8% GDP growth. This forecast of 2.8% growth has not changed significantly since May’s first response.
SPX at 1078.17 as this post is written